Congressman Walker announces 2022 US Senate run

Walker will seek the seat held now by Sen. Richard Burr, who is not seeking re-election. Walker is the first major candidate to announce for the seat, which won't come before voters until 2022.

In his announcement, Walker walks the streets of Greensboro, interacting with supporters, including Clarence Henderson, who was part of the landmark Woolworth's sit-ins that helped desegregate lunch counters.

“I do believe it’s about time," Walker tells Henderson, as the two stand outside Woolworth's. "Are you in?"

“All the way," replies Henderson, who is a vocal Republican. "North Carolina needs you, Mark."

Henderson then pitches to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, now a GOP pundit, who offers his own ringing endorsement.

Then Walker walks the streets some more, ticking off a laundry list of far-left ideas he promises to oppose.

"Washington has lost its mind," he says.

The video includes virtual and in-person endorsements – all filmed outside – from a diverse group of supporters, including Richard Sneed, principal chief of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, and Greensboro pastor Odell Cleveland.

In an interview with WRAL News on Tuesday afternoon, Walker said he hopes to draw wider support than the traditional Republican base, even in the GOP primary. He was the only House Republican this year named to the United Negro College Fund's HBCU Congressional Honor Roll, a recognition of his advocacy for historically Black colleges and universities.

“Don’t just be content with preaching to the choir," Walker said in a Zoom call from Washington, D.C. "Republicans do that way too often. If we truly believe that our message of individual liberty and opportunity is good for all of our communities, then why not build the relationships to talk about these things?”

Walker's four-minute announcement ends with a large, socially distanced, gathering in a parking lot. Walker said he wrote and directed the video himself.

Walker also dove early into his 2014 run for Congress, taking a bus across the district and campaigning hard despite being scoffed at as an underdog in the race. He won a runoff in the Republican primary that year against Phil Berger Jr., son of the powerful state Senate leader and, at the time, a district attorney in the congressional district.

Democrat Kathy Manning won Walker's seat last month with 62 percent of the vote.

In Tuesday's Zoom interview, Walker said he hopes to have support from President Donald Trump. Asked about the president's frequent lies and attempts to overturn the November elections, Walker said "those are your words" and that he wasn't going to call the president a liar. He acknowledged that the president's harshness "is a turnoff for many people," but he gave Trump high marks for accomplishing conservative policy goals.

As for the election, Walker said the president is entitled to fight the results in court, and when that process ends ,there will have to be "some decisions publicly made on his part."

Walker also said he hopes Congress will soon pass a new coronavirus pandemic relief package but that House Democrats have to drop their insistence on bailout money for city governments.

He also addressed his role in a bribery scheme that played out over the last few years in North Carolina politics. Walker was one of many North Carolina politicians to accept campaign contributions from Greg Lindberg, a wealthy insurance company owner who was convicted earlier this year of trying to bribe North Carolina Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey.

Walker was never charged, has denied wrongdoing and donated some of Lindberg's donations – those to his personal campaign – to charity. He said Tuesday that he was never called to testify, though an investigator reached out early in the inquiry to speak with him.

"I think Sen. Burr’s done a lot for North Carolina," he said. "I hope this can be resolved."

Asked what will be the hallmark of his coming campaign, Walker said he'll run on his record, and he promised to go "places that Republicans don't normally go."